Friends Reunited Relaunch Focuses On Privacy And Nostalgia

Friends Reunited is to relaunch itself in a bid to stay relevant in a social media market now dominated by Facebook.

Much like MySpace, Friends Reunited is repositioning itself, although it's plumping for a very different angle - that of nostalgia. The website, which grew massively after its launch in 2000 to become the UK's first major networking site, was sold to ITV for £175 million in 2005.

When ITV offloaded it in 2009 to Brightsolid, it only recouped £25 million of that initial investment.

Friends Reunited still believes it can compete in the market, however, with a relaunch which focuses on giving the user full control and "simple" privacy settings, the BBC reports.

The other avenue of attack is memory lane, allowing the user to store and share their own photos and video memories, and also browse back through public nostalgia-driven photo archives. Historic events such as the Silver Jubilee or Maggie's Britain will be covered in these public albums containing some 350,000 images in total.

Chris van der Kuyl, chief executive of Brightsolid, commented: "We're really excited about the opportunity to provide a uniquely nostalgic experience for the UK mainstream, that's not only entertaining and engaging, but powerful and lasting too."

"Nowhere else can you find a single place to search, collect and save the bigger, more important moments in your life, memories which, in today's digital world, are in danger of slipping through your fingers."

"We need to protect our precious and shared memories for longevity, which the new site enables you to do, or we're at risk of becoming the lost generation."